The drizzle had lightened. Ruben and Corbin were on the streets walking again, hands jabbed into their pockets as they were talking.
"What do you think we'll actually have to do to clear our names?" Ruben asked.
Corbin snorted. A scoff with cynicism laced into the exhale. "Ruben, you're asking the wrong question. It's more about what they'll let us do. Alfred Stein seems to want us dead."
Ruben frowned faintly. "So what do you think we should do?"
Corbin's voice grew flat. "I think we silence him. Or we become so great that the weight of our name alone turns the tides. Bigger than his smear. And louder than his grainy voice."
Ruben blinked, chewing on the thought. "That would be hard." He then went quiet for a moment and then suddenly asked. "You ever heard of the giants that live in the sky?"
Corbin's head snapped sideways and gave a sharp incredulous glare. "What?"
"Like, up above the clouds," Ruben pointed vaguely toward the dark clouds, as if one might peer back down. "In Zuberia. Giants live among humans."
Corbin stopped walking entirely, just to stare. "Do you even hear yourself? You switch topics like a broken compass. One second we're on Alfred Stein and clearing our name. Next you're speaking about the damn giant race. However small your brain is, Ruben, it spins way too much."
Ruben laughed, rubbing at the back of his neck. "What? I was just wondering. What it's like living among them up there."
Corbin sighed so loudly a passerby glanced over, but there was the faintest twitch at his mouth. "You're dumb."
The mood lightened for a few paces.
Maybe we should start using weapons," Ruben said, thoughtful. "It might be cool. And I wanna try out an Ego tool."
Corbin arched a brow. "Dragons aren't enough for you now?"
"Of course they are, but…"
The sound of shattering glass cut him off, a sharp spray of noise that cracked through the drizzle. Both boys froze, heads turning toward the side street.
From the corner of Corbin's eye, he saw them first, shadows lurching, the quick jerks of limbs attacking. "Ruben."
Ruben looked and his breath stuttered. People were tearing into each other. Shoving, clawing, fists pounding without rhyme or reason. One woman slammed her head against a shop window until it cracked further. Another man gnawed at his own arm until blood streamed down his wrist.
For a moment, the world stilled around that madness in front of them. It stretched beyond, much further than they could see. They were just at the edge of it, luckily.
Ruben sniffed. And it was there, a very faint sweet, almost like fruit left too long on the counter. His stomach turned at the wrongness that was affecting these people. "It's gas."
Corbin's jaw tightened. "We should go in."
"Nah." Ruben hissed, shoving his arm in to block him. "If it hits you too we're done, and we have powers, we'd actually kill people."
Corbin growled low. "There haven't been any reports of Paladin or Ego users falling under it. None."
"Yeah but there also haven't been any Ego users that have been caught in it." Ruben responded back.
The screams down the street sharpened the air again.
Ruben's gaze snapped back to the crowd. "The source has to be in the center…"
"Obviousy." Corbin muttered.
"...then maybe I can spot them with my dragons, and then grab them." Ruben's voice steadied. "And I can use smaller ones to keep the others from killing each other. Restrain them. Something like that."
Corbin gave him a long, skeptical look. "Won't your dragons be affected too?"
Ruben shrugged. "Don't know. But I can always get rid of them before they lose control if that does happen."
Corbin pinched the bridge of his nose. "Do it. But quick. We need to hide before Paladin swarm the place. We're still wanted, remember?"
Ruben nodded, his pulse quickening. He exhaled once, then stretched out his hand. Tiny coils of blue light shimmered into the air.
"Alright then." Ruben whispered. "Time to play pest control."
The dragons darted into the crowd, only one was set up for search and the others were mainly acting to stop the attacks from going farther than they needed to.
Whoever was partaking in these attacks clearly had no care for the lives of the people in these places. But so far there had been no deaths, so Ruben did wonder what the end goal was.
"Spin that tiny brain fast, Ruben,"
***
The street was broken with screams. The sound wasn't just chaos, it was teeth grinding against teeth, wet fists slapping flesh. At the edge of the scene, Rosette stood with the other Paladin, her crimson eyes shocked at the craziness she was seeing.
Elise's hand lifted. "Masks. Now."
Rosette obeyed without hesitation. The mask was placed with a rune to filter out the gas that Oscar Lorian would be emitting. It set over her mouth and nose, cool leather pressing against her cheekbones. She drew in a breath. Nothing. Just clean and thin air.
Internally she nodded. Oscar leaking the gas uncontrollably from his body wouldn't be able to etch through their protections. Unless it would just grow in strength, but there was no information about that.
Her gaze flickered to Bruno as he stepped forward, his presence weighted like a hammer on the air. "Lance is in surveillance. Kade, abstain from the group. Search vantage points. Strahm could be anywhere near the perimeter."
Kade's smirk was brief but respectful under his mask, he tipped his chin and slipped away without a word.
Bruno turned back, eyes flaring with command. "Move!"
Rosette did not wait for the others. Her body surged ahead, the thrill of purpose tightening in her chest. She ran straight into the madness.
The stench of blood hit first. It was greater here than any of the other places this gas had hit. Then the sound, horrible, wet and grinding noises that made her stomach threaten to release what was in it.
People clawed at each other like rabid beasts. Drool stretched like strings from mouths, and some chewed their teeth so violently she could hear enamel shatter. It made her shiver, but not slow down.
A man lunged from her left, a knife flashing in his hand. She pivoted low, knocking the blade clean from his grip, then twisted and flung him aside. His body crashed through a line of barrels, wood exploding into splinters. Rosette's boots kept running.
Her thoughts surged with every stride. Why am I here? Why did I choose this path?
She remembered her childhood in flashes. There was warmth, so much warmth but then it was snatched away and she only felt the coldness of chains. Dark rooms and whispers in foreign tongues. Hands dragging her where she did not belong.
She had been taken, sold, bartered like fruit in a market. The same space in the black market that Bruno Fernando had destroyed.
Now he hadn't saved her, but instead she was lucky. Lucky that not everyone searching on the black market had bad intentions, lucky that some were just looking for a child to call their own. If she were not so lucky and the laws in Ostara for certain groups weren't so restrictive, she may have fallen into the ownership of some depraved individual with a lot of money and bad intentions.
But Bruno Fernando, she remembers seeing the news before she started a new year in middle school of the man exposing the organization of being traffickers that pretended to find new homes and spaces to refugees but instead fattened themselves and their pockets on their pain.
Rosette had trembled when she learned it, not from fear, but from awe. Someone out there had been strong and smart enough to rip off the masks of monsters.
And then there was Dario Kosta. His name had once burned like a star. Now ash. Although she still respected the man in many regards. The flame he had lit, of strength and unyielding presence, it still burned in her chest.
She wanted that power, and for it to be aimed toward the light. She would wield it for the nation. For the people of the nation. She would climb higher and higher, until she was named as Ostara's Warlord.
Her boots struck the stones harder. No matter what!
She darted between bodies, her blood thrumming hot in her veins. And then, movement overhead. Something soft, almost delicate, brushed the corner of her vision. She looked up.
A pastel pink dragon glided through the gas.
Rosette's breath caught. In that instant she remembered Ruben Rayo. The outlaw. The enemy. Both he and Corbin Monet were wrapped in false goodness.
Her response was instinct. Crimson burst from her skin, thick and gleaming. It solidified in her hands, a sword formed from her very lifeblood. With one clean sweep, she cleaved through the dragon, its pastel body splitting apart in ribbons of light.
Her heart pounded harder. They're here.
Her jaw set. She remembered all the liars she had seen in her short life, the traffickers who paraded themselves as saviours, the men who bought and sold children promising better futures. Paladin giving up as soon as the job got too tough. Dario Kosta and the truths that were coming out about him.
Ruben and Corbin fit that mold. Dragging darkness behind them. They could not be trusted.
She would crush them. She would carve them into stepping stones beneath her boots, the foundation for her climb.
"I'll be the one to do it." She whispered. "I'll take them down."
And then she heard something hit her. A fragile, broken sound that cut through the frenzy. A child's whimper.
Rosette spun. Just ahead, tucked between overturned carts, was a boy. His knees hugged to his chest, his body shaking with sobs. Wide eyes, wet with fear.
Oscar.
Her heart surged. She broke into a run, her voice calling out, clear and sharp through her mask. "Oscar!"
For a moment, he looked at her.
Then the world bent.
A gust slammed into her chest, invisible but violent. Her feet left the ground, her head snapping back as though a giant hand had swatted her aside. She staggered, boots skidding across stone, arms flung out for balance.
When she straightened, her crimson eyes shot forward.
The boy was gone.
The night air was restless. A neighbourhood away from the chaos, windows were glowing with hesitant lamplight, shutters creaking open as people leaned out to gawk at the direction of the noise.
Ruben and Corbin lingered near.
"I saw them." His voice was quick and clipped. "There were a few Paladin. Lea was among them."
Corbin raised a brow, already unimpressed. "Obviously she was there. What else?"
"And Rosette killed one of my dragons."
The look that crossed Corbin's face was not shock but annoyance, like Ruben had told him he'd dropped their last coin in a sewer grate. "Figures." He jerked his chin. "Go on."
Ruben licked his teeth, jaw tight. "The gas. I found the source. It was spreading from some kid. He looked about Fionn's age."
That made Corbin's shoulders stiffen. "A brat?"
Ruben nodded, already jogging ahead. "Not just that. There was someone else. An older guy, face covered. He grabbed the kid and dragged him into the sewers."
Corbin fell into stride beside him. "So what, you wanna try intercept him?"
"Yeah." Ruben's voice sharpened, there was a hint of excitement in his tone. "We just have to grab the boy. Then run."
Corbin gave him a sideways look. "Guess the kids in trouble."
"Yeah." Ruben muttered. They had already helped one child while in the new city, and this one seemed to be in a much closer proximity to the danger surrounding him.
They found a rusted gate tucked between buildings. Ruben wrenched it open with a groan of metal, and they both dropped into the stink below. The sewers yawned before them. Ruben's smaller dragons burst into being, like pale flares and pastel light in the dark.
"We should only focus on grabbing the kid and running." Ruben said, sending his dragons ahead. "If Paladin followed, we ditch. Let them chew on the other guy instead."
Corbin snorted. "Fine by me."
They rounded a corner at a jog... then froze.
Someone was there, running too but stopped as he nearly ran into the two boys. The guy was taller than either of them, boring and plain. No scars. A face so ordinary, like every detail had been sanded down until nothing was left.
But in his hands was the boy. Light brown hair, streaked with dirt and tears dancing down his face. The boy's eyes were wet, and blank, lifeless.
Ruben's chest squeezed.
Corbin moved first, his fist was a blur. It missed, smashing into the wall with a concussive thud that made the stone quake. The man jerked back, the boy still in his arms, then moved with a strange stiff precision. His hands pressed flat against invisible air...
Ruben's senses felt off, he felt like there was now a large brick wall in front of the man. He relied on those instincts, he ducked aside and his breath ripped through his teeth.
He caught Corbin's motion, a kick snapping out, his foot hooking like a stirrup.
"Go!"
Ruben planted, vaulted, spinning in the air. His boot connected square with the man's chest.
The stranger staggered, arms loosening. The boy slipped free.
A pastel dragon swooped down like a diving kite, talons curling gently around the boy's small body before flaring skyward. The child was wrenched from the danger in a flash of wings.
The man screamed. It wasn't fear. It was fury, guttural and sharp enough to rake at the walls.
"YOU OSTARAN FILTH!" His voice was like knives scraping stone. "Your dirt colours, they're everywhere. You people rot everything you touch! You smile, you frolic, you go home to your neat houses while the world chokes!" His face twisted, for as bland as his look, he still could display a wide array of emotion. Mainly anger.
Anger for Ostaran people. Ruben thought to quickly tell him that they were not from Ostara, but they were citizens, and their would be no reason to speak on their old world. That would just be confusing.
The man's face twisted into rage, looking into his eyes felt like looking into a deep and dark well. "I'll drag it all down! I'll strip the paint from your pretty streets and drown you in your own piss!"
Ruben's skin crawled.
Corbin grabbed his arm. "We don't have time to listen to this freaks diary entry. Move."
They bolted. Ruben flung his arms, dragons surging bigger, brighter with thicker bodies to block the tunnels as they wound behind them. He could hear the man cursing.
Then there was movement ahead of them.
The bland man stepped through a door of air. No hinges. No wood. Just... an opening he had mimed into being. He emerged right in front of them, eyes wild.
Corbin didn't blink. He caught Ruben's sleeve, spun him like a hammer throw. "Again!"
Ruben flailed in the air, colliding with something solid, invisible. His lungs punched empty.
The man's hands pressed like he was bracing a wall.
But before he could press harder, Corbin was there. A blur of muscle and grit. His palm smashed into the man's face with a crunch, sending him sprawling backwards.
"Stay bland on the ground, grumpy bastard." Corbin spat.
Ruben coughed, flung his dragons into motion. They were flying in fast motion and then pinned the man under their pastel weight and then toppled the walls above him to crush him under. He wouldn't die, but he just needed to be out of their way.
"Up. Now!" Ruben barked.
Dragons lifted the two boys up and started soaring through the damp tunnels, water hissing in their wake.
They eventually burst from a grate that had been opened by one of Ruben's earlier dragons that had been carrying the young crying boy.